


Step 1 in "How To Handle A Crisis" (consult your lawyer, not your doctor)

by ApprenticedMagician



Series: Twinyards Appreciation Week [3]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Banter, Brotherly Bonding, Brothers, Gen, Implied Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard, Midlife Crisis, Misunderstandings, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-14
Updated: 2017-11-14
Packaged: 2019-02-02 00:55:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12716433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApprenticedMagician/pseuds/ApprenticedMagician
Summary: Neil is, predictably, at the center of Andrew's latest crisis.Aaron is NOT equipped to help his brother through it but that doesn't mean he won't try - it's the brotherly thing to do, after all.





	Step 1 in "How To Handle A Crisis" (consult your lawyer, not your doctor)

**Author's Note:**

> This is my favourite fic out of the four I wrote for the appreciation week. (I dunno about you guys, but I think I write waaaay better comedy than horror.) This fic's theme was "the future" so I gave a glimpse into the Twinyards relationship at it's BEST!

_Coming over. Just me._

The text isn’t unusual, per se. Or, at least, the content of the text isn’t unusual. For the past five years or so, whenever Andrew and Neil are in town for an away game, Katelyn and Aaron expect them to drop by for coffee and a visit. Even the fact that Andrew is coming on his own isn’t cause for alarm. 

It’s the timing that’s suspicious; usually visitations don’t happen until after the game is won or lost but Andrew’s coming now and it’s hours before the time that’s printed on his and Katelyn’s tickets.

By the time Andrew walks through the front door, Aaron’s dropping jumbo marshmallows into a mug of hot chocolate for him.

Andrew mumbles, “Thanks.” Then, without pausing his stride, he grabs a couple extra marshmallows to eat, snatches up his mug, and lays out on the couch, his head propped by the arm of the couch and his feet barely reaching the far cushion.

Then, he  _sighs_  and bemoans, “What now, Aaron?”

Aaron blinks a few times, as though his eyes are playing tricks on him and any minute now he’ll realize Andrew’s actually sitting on top of the kitchen table like he usually does and is actually asking how Katelyn’s handling the pregnancy.

Nope. His blinks change nothing. Andrew remains laid out on the couch, like he’s mistaken Aaron’s home for Betsy’s office, and he’s ripping a marshmallow into pieces and looking as miserable as Aaron’s ever seen him.

“Hi, brother,” Aaron intones, half thinking this is could be a missing Minyard triplet he’s meeting for the first time, “I’m just fine, how are you? Oh the wife? Busy as ever, finishing up her shift and putting bread on the table.”

“Shut up, Aaron,” Andrew grumbles, half-heartedly chewing on his marshmallow. “You’ve never been the funny twin.”

The missing Minyard triplet theory looks more and more likely by the second. Perplexed, Aaron moves into the living room and takes the bag of marshmallows with him in case he needs projectiles to chase a stranger out of his home.

“Where’s Neil?” he asks, determined to settle this triplet hypothesis once and for all.

Andrew shoots him a dead-eyed glare. “His oh-so-precious Exy court. Where did you think?”

Aaron feels the blood leave his face at once. 

Oh, god. 

Oh! _God_ , he’s misread this entire thing! It isn’t a stranger on his couch, it’s a  _crisis_  - Andrew and Neil are getting a divorce!

Aaron drops into an armchair, no longer trusting his feet or the floor beneath them and just simply says, “Andrew…”

It comes out on a whisper because Aaron’s not sure what else there is to say. How did this happen? How far and how badly did Neil overstep Andrew’s boundaries to let it come to divorce? And after six years of marriage?! Was beating Neil up the brotherly thing to do? Aaron had a pregnant wife and a medical career to think about, he couldn’t go around assaulting people, even if they had broken his brother’s heart like he used to fear. And what about - !

Andrew’s  _career_. How would this affect their team? Would one of them have to move teams? Would Andrew even want to remain in professional exy without Neil for a partner? And - !

Their  _cats_. They had _cats_  and a  _shared lease_  and oh, god, Aaron was a doctor, not a lawyer, why had Andrew come to him?! Andrew was the one who studied law in university. (Criminal justice was the same thing as divorce law, right? Was it even called divorce law??)

“Never should have followed him into Exy in the first place,” Andrew was muttering, sipping past the marshmallows in his mug, not seeming to notice or care that he had tilted too far and some hot chocolate was dribbling past his chin. “Now all those years are behind me.” He huffs and shakes his head, obviously in self-deprecation. “Retirement at thirty. What a joke of a career.”

…Retirement…?

Aaron has to clear his throat. “You’re retiring??” he asks, just for clarification.

Andrew glares into his mug but mutters, “Yeah,” and suddenly all of Aaron’s stress melts away from his shoulders and he lets his head fall back over the chair. Andrew and Neil aren’t getting a divorce - Andrew’s just having a midlife crisis now that he’s decided to retire.

“I’m guessing you haven’t told Neil?” Aaron asks, not bothering to lift his head from its loll now that it’s comfy and relaxed. ( _God_ , it’s times like these he misses cracker dust the most…)

“His contract isn’t up for renewal until next season. He hasn’t asked me about mine.”

Aaron finds that hard to believe. “He wants to.”

He hears Andrew snort. “Yeah, he wants to.”

“And you?” Aaron lifts his head again, just so he could see the truth play out on Andrew’s face but his brother is drinking instead of replying and the only thing Aaron can see on his face is the trail of hot chocolate that missed the mark. After giving him a few minutes, Aaron tries another angle, “There’s always going to be a first season he plays without you. Neil’s the type who will play until he’s fifty-six and limping - you’re not that guy.”

Andrew was nodding along, still glowering miserably. “So if my junkie husband is off playing stickball for another twenty-six years, what do I do in the meantime?”

Aaron chucks a marshmallow at his brother’s head. “Your own thing, dumbass. Get a job, volunteer, learn to cook, whatever. Literally, whatever you want. You certainly aren’t hurting for money.”

Andrew sputters a few choice words into his empty mug and Aaron could laugh himself right off his seat if he didn’t think Andrew might stab him into silence.

“You want another one?” he asks, getting up to go to the kitchen. At least there he can laugh his ass off in peace.

“Add booze,” Andrew calls, sounding a little less morose than before.

“I’m not getting you drunk for your last game!”

“It’s not my last game, you moron.”

But it will be his last season. Aaron wonders if this means Andrew will make time to visit him more often, especially once there’s a little niece or nephew to visit and influence. He thinks he’ll extend an explicit invitation Andrew’s way, just in case the thought hadn’t occurred.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
